World of Warcraft - Lore & Storyline discussion [SPOILERS] - Page 298

Kumar · 08/10/09, 8:51 PM

On another note, WoW.com saying that multiple sources are confirming to them that the next expansion is called, World of Warcraft:Cataclysm with the following new races:

Alliance - Worgen
Horde - Goblin

The interesting bit will be Worgen's backstory and how a race that has till now been shown as evil will come to ally with the Horde. And maybe, just maybe further the Black Riders storyline from Karazhan area.

Edit: Source : Cataclysm races leaked

Zaniel · 08/10/09, 9:20 PM

I didn't realize the original picture I posted broke some time back, so I edited and rehosted. This is Tirion's explanation for why the Tournament is as it is. I guess it makes sense.

On a different note, though, if you think about the "gating" as a method of delaying in-game for lore reasons, it might explain why (out of seemingly nowhere) the floor of the coliseum will collapse in a few weeks. They've had weeks to prepare and DIG the darn thing.

ildon · 08/11/09, 2:30 AM

From Blizzcast 10:

Originally Posted by Dave Maldonado

The Argent Crusade’s tournament serves two purposes really. One is to unite the Alliance and the Horde in their efforts against Icecrown. It was never really kind of a unified thing from the very start and after the events at the Wrathgate it just completely fell apart. And so Tirion’s really just trying to get the two factions and their leaders – you know and sort of all the heroes that are working under them, for them – together at the tournament and sort of trying to change the way that they see one another, or communicate with one another and, you know, get them actually working together against this thing instead of wheeling around in the sky above Icecrown taking pot shots at one another.

And really the second goal is Tirion’s just gathering heroes to assault Icecrown; and again, the events at the Wrathgate really showed that, you know, any conventional force that assaults the citadel are just going to get kind of wiped out en masse and then raised as undead, attack their own commanders and it’s all going to fall apart. So the idea is that this relatively small force of very skilled and very well-equipped attackers can maybe move on the citadel and see some degree of success. So not only does the tournament, with all its rewards, draw adventurers that might not normally show up just out of a sense of duty. It’ll get people that are looking for fame, people that are looking for money, you know, just really all the bad asses in Northrend together. It allows Tirion to sort of scout them all and kind of hand-pick the best candidates for this final attack.

So there you have it. The official justification for the tournament, most of which was already speculated.

Vaccine · 08/11/09, 6:21 AM

Originally Posted by Wanderah

I for one see no issue with the ideas behind the tournament. Its natural and simplistic that the argent crusade would want to test the mettle of their champions before engaging Arthas. Many cultures like to test their fighters and make sure they're ready before the final challenge. It also doesn't surprise me that Tirion chooses to let us handle the black knight. He seems surprised by it, but there's no need for him to shout for us to handle it as we're already there in the arena, ready to go.

I think the point is its location. They could have just as easily held it in Outlands or Kalimdor or another relatively safe place (even Crystalsong given its anti scourge properties) but holding it so close just begs for interference by Arthas, putting all eggs in one basket on his door step is not smart. And lo and behold we have the Black Knight, Arthas and Anub'Arak all showing up to the party. I mean if it wasn't a game he would have FILLED the cavern with scourge instead of just Anub Arak and wiped us out without any chance of fighting back. It is all just so senseless. The whole patch that is. I mean how did the Argent Crusade establish the At the Foot of the Citadel daily quest area, past the mountains of giant scourge and Frost Wyrms who are just chililng out behind them? Its like they just decided to ignore their defences. We did a little work on them during the IC quests but not enough to get a foothold like that, and one so flimsily defended. I don't even want to think how the horses got there. Then there's the inconsistency with the Black Knight being allowed to kill the announcer guy with no one intervening, none of the aerial patrols trying to stop him, no defences to prevent him just flying his skeleton bird into the top of the arena. No new mission to destroy him after he was found to have regenerated from that quest chain. Bah, it all just seems so sloppy.

Wanderah · 08/11/09, 7:06 AM

Originally Posted by Vaccine

I think the point is its location. They could have just as easily held it in Outlands or Kalimdor or another relatively safe place (even Crystalsong given its anti scourge properties) but holding it so close just begs for interference by Arthas, putting all eggs in one basket on his door step is not smart. And lo and behold we have the Black Knight, Arthas and Anub'Arak all showing up to the party. I mean if it wasn't a game he would have FILLED the cavern with scourge instead of just Anub Arak and wiped us out without any chance of fighting back. It is all just so senseless. The whole patch that is. I mean how did the Argent Crusade establish the At the Foot of the Citadel daily quest area, past the mountains of giant scourge and Frost Wyrms who are just chililng out behind them? Its like they just decided to ignore their defences. We did a little work on them during the IC quests but not enough to get a foothold like that, and one so flimsily defended. I don't even want to think how the horses got there. Then there's the inconsistency with the Black Knight being allowed to kill the announcer guy with no one intervening, none of the aerial patrols trying to stop him, no defences to prevent him just flying his skeleton bird into the top of the arena. No new mission to destroy him after he was found to have regenerated from that quest chain. Bah, it all just seems so sloppy.

But the Argent Crusade has a history of being a bit too close to the Scourge in their areas of operation, LHC, WPL this is nothing new for them. I think it also rings of defiance to Arthas that "we're not going to let you control our lives or what/where we do things". it's almost a challenge laid out to Arthas, one that he'll answer in a few weeks.

Nathanyel · 08/11/09, 7:20 AM

Originally Posted by VerziehenOne

Maybe the entire encounter is partially to show that the Argent Crusade is nuts, and losing it a bit?

I think another purpose of the Tournament is to provoke the Lich King ("we're on your lawn, killing your pets while having fun doing sport") to make him send more important figures like the Black Knight, Chillmaw and Anub'arak out of the Citadel, where they would be harder to defeat.

Linnet · 08/11/09, 7:57 AM

Originally Posted by Nathanyel

I think another purpose of the Tournament is to provoke the Lich King ("we're on your lawn, killing your pets while having fun doing sport") to make him send more important figures like the Black Knight, Chillmaw and Anub'arak out of the Citadel, where they would be harder to defeat.

It is just possible that they're working on other plans at the same time. I mean, I think it's unlikely but they might be planning something funky with holy ground, considering the effect it had at LHC.

Jagiya · 08/11/09, 9:04 AM

Originally Posted by Vaccine

I mean how did the Argent Crusade establish the At the Foot of the Citadel daily quest area, past the mountains of giant scourge and Frost Wyrms who are just chililng out behind them?

Be mindful that once you've completed each and every quest in Icecrown (Horde and Alliance), you've pretty much obliterated most of the Scourge in the zone right up to the Citadel itself. For gameplay reasons, it doesn't appear this way to the player, but over the last X months, the Horde and Alliance have cleaned up pretty much everything in Icecrown in order for the Argent Crusade to make these kind of advances.

Take a moment to consider what Icecrown would actually look like if every single Scourge you've killed didn't respawn.

Mr. Crow · 08/11/09, 9:31 AM

Originally Posted by Vaccine

I think the point is its location. They could have just as easily held it in Outlands or Kalimdor or another relatively safe place (even Crystalsong given its anti scourge properties) but holding it so close just begs for interference by Arthas, putting all eggs in one basket on his door step is not smart. And lo and behold we have the Black Knight, Arthas and Anub'Arak all showing up to the party. I mean if it wasn't a game he would have FILLED the cavern with scourge instead of just Anub Arak and wiped us out without any chance of fighting back. It is all just so senseless. The whole patch that is. I mean how did the Argent Crusade establish the At the Foot of the Citadel daily quest area, past the mountains of giant scourge and Frost Wyrms who are just chililng out behind them? Its like they just decided to ignore their defences. We did a little work on them during the IC quests but not enough to get a foothold like that, and one so flimsily defended. I don't even want to think how the horses got there. Then there's the inconsistency with the Black Knight being allowed to kill the announcer guy with no one intervening, none of the aerial patrols trying to stop him, no defences to prevent him just flying his skeleton bird into the top of the arena. No new mission to destroy him after he was found to have regenerated from that quest chain. Bah, it all just seems so sloppy.

There are very few interesting stories where everything went according to plan.

From a narrative standpoint, the Tournament is in Icecrown because Blizzard WANTS Arthas to interfere. If it were in Crystalsong instead, Arthas could not interfere and the Tournament would go off completely without a hitch, which would make it far less interesting unless they really played up the whole Horde vs. Alliance thing, which isn't really the point.

Does it rankle a bit that the Black Knight is absolutely no surprise? I would have found the 5-man much more interesting if the Black Knight was just one of several possible final encounters you could have, instead of always having his silly entrance. However, does the Black Knight do the job of reminding people how present a threat Arthas can be? Sure he does. We just don't take him seriously because a) his encounter is mechanically uncomplicated and easy and b) he's a really, really, played out Monty Python joke.

But it's a joke that everyone gets, and Blizzard is in the business of making simple entertainment for everyone. I've come to realize that any complex and interesting narrative that comes out of World of Warcraft is not going to come from Blizzard itself, but has to be extrapolated from the game by people who make the impersonal game experience personal.

• Melthu · 08/11/09, 10:06 AM

Originally Posted by Jagiya

Be mindful that once you've completed each and every quest in Icecrown (Horde and Alliance), you've pretty much obliterated most of the Scourge in the zone right up to the Citadel itself. For gameplay reasons, it doesn't appear this way to the player, but over the last X months, the Horde and Alliance have cleaned up pretty much everything in Icecrown in order for the Argent Crusade to make these kind of advances.

Take a moment to consider what Icecrown would actually look like if every single Scourge you've killed didn't respawn.

Not really. We certainly weakened the Scourge in many areas, but haven't actually taken any land beyond Crusader's Pinnacle and the Shadow Vault (and basically wiped out the Scarlet Onslaught). We did a lot of work in taking out the most dangerous threats at Mord'rethar, Aldur'thar, and Corp'rethar in preparation for an assault by the Alliance and Horde, but those assaults haven't yet taken place. We disrupted production at Malykriss, but we didn't shut it down completely like we did with the Fleshwerks. And as Matthias Lehner showed us, any action we took against the nameless troops of the Scourge was mostly useless. The majority of Icecrown is still under Scourge control.

Emily · 08/11/09, 10:40 AM

The Making of World of Warcraft Article - Page 1 // MMO /// Eurogamer - Games Reviews, News and More

Interesting Eurogamer article. It seems that an early vision of WoW was a much darker one, set 100 years after Warcraft III.

Exemplar · 08/11/09, 11:05 AM

Originally Posted by Jagiya

Take a moment to consider what Icecrown would actually look like if every single Scourge you've killed didn't respawn.

Full of undead Trolls, (Grizzly) bears, and Vrykul? You know, everything we've killed in every other Northrend zone re-animated? Oh, and all those Horde/Alliance that slaughtered each other on the fields and shoot each other down regularly. And the Frost Wyrms we're letting him animate.

Arthas is not hurting for undead. If so he wouldn't be holding his own Argent Tournament. Remember, he's having Vrykul fight and only the strongest are recruited to his army of undeath. He has such a huge supply that even he is taking only the best of the best. If things go south and he needs endless grunt skeletons and zombies, he has them in spades.

He's barely tapped his supply of undead Nerubians. They had a kingdom, he toppled it and raised the populace. We've fought a mere handful in AN and a single Elder with eggs in Old Kingdom.

Don't even get me started on the potential army of undead penguins...

In short, Icecrown respawns actually make sense of the game mechanic. He can replace them. However, I'm honestly surprised we don't have a Bashiir Landing-style fight to defend Shadow Vault on a regular basis. You'd think Arthas would want his Fleshwerks and such restored.

Talgog · 08/11/09, 11:18 AM

Originally Posted by Exemplar

In short, Icecrown respawns actually make sense of the game mechanic. He can replace them. However, I'm honestly surprised we don't have a Bashiir Landing-style fight to defend Shadow Vault on a regular basis. You'd think Arthas would want his Fleshwerks and such restored.

Shadow Vault is under constant attack. But it's indestructable (living Saronite), unapproachable due to location, and defended by the Ebon Blade doing a 300 routine at the only stairway in.

It's actually pretty plausible as a ground bastion. The place never fell to a frontal attack, after all. The Ebon Blade took it down from the inside.

Exemplar · 08/11/09, 11:37 AM

Originally Posted by Talgog

Shadow Vault is under constant attack. But it's indestructable (living Saronite), unapproachable due to location, and defended by the Ebon Blade doing a 300 routine at the only stairway in.

It's actually pretty plausible as a ground bastion.

And geist can crawl up walls - or over the mountainside from various directions. Banshee can fly. Frost Wyrms could literally drop undead (who cares if their legs break and they're immobile on landing) anywhere in massive numbers. Fly a citadel over it for crying out loud. Cult of the Damned suicide bombers. Bombers in general on a cliff overlooking just chucking down explosives. No stair up? Just redirect your quarry crew to cut one quickly.

Or Divide and conquer: keep your Ebon Spartans busy on the stairs and go recover the Fleshwerks to mass produce more abomination.

If the Shadow Vault is indestructable, how was it shaped? Something has to be able to mold or cut it. Even if you cannot cut it you can move some mass around to open new doors/windows in the back to waltz right in.

Realistically Arthas could/would crush both Shadow Vaults and the Tourney on his doorstep. We suspend disbelief and enjoy the game. I'm just surprised Blizzard doesn't use some options as they have in the past. Non-instanced combat like Bashiir's landing can be fun when the rewards are sharable (vendor) rather than competitive (long spawn timer World boss loot).

Bregonn · 08/11/09, 1:11 PM

Originally Posted by Exemplar

Realistically Arthas could/would crush both Shadow Vaults and the Tourney on his doorstep.

If he has unlimited resources. However, he hasn't. If he would have then we wouldn't been slapping him all over Icecrown. Play some RTS's and talk to your opponents afterwards; the enemy is always less dangerous and/or has more problems than you think.

And the Tournament is nowhere near his doorstep. It (and the Shadow Vault as well) is basically half a continent away from Icecrown Citadel. It's easily to forget that when it's only a few minute flight for players. Large air drops half a continent away are pretty darn hard to organize unopposed (ask the US army how long it took to build up for Afghanistan), no one has tried against active opposition so far. And the same goes for moving an army through half a continent of underground tunnels.

A few commando's (like the Black Knight and Anub'Arak in the case of the Tournament or the players in Battle before the Citadel), yes that's doable.